The morning after was not quiet.
News spread like a crack of thunder across Central Command.
Nina Tucker missing.
Shou Tucker found catatonic, unrecognizable, and surrounded by damning evidence.
Rumors swirled, clawing at the edges of the truth like hungry dogs. Speculation became hysteria. Truth bled slowly, piece by piece, until it painted a picture no one could turn away from.
Military investigators stormed the Tucker estate within hours. What they found stopped even the most hardened alchemists in their tracks.
Scorched walls bearing transmutation runes in languages forgotten. Arcane residue never seen before. A humanoid chimera—twitching, muttering, whimpering—in the corner of a room stained with sorrow.
That was all that remained of Shou Tucker.
Gone was the man once hailed as the Sewing-Life Alchemist. What stood in his place was a malformed shadow of his former self, physically altered and mentally broken.
He could no longer speak—only groan, whimper, and laugh at things no one else saw.
A sealed room.
An unconscious chimera.
And evidence. So much evidence.
Stacks of records. Audio logs of failed experiments. Diagrams of fusion rituals—some with his wife's name. Others, labeled with his daughter's.
One envelope sat open atop his desk, left as if deliberately.
"To those who find this: monsters live among you wearing human skin. And they don't just take lives.They take futures."
There was no signature.Just a single black feather resting on the paper.
General Hakuro read the report with trembling hands.
Colonel Mustang crushed his cigarette in silence.
Even Lieutenant Hawkeye paled.
Word traveled fast. Within a day, all high-ranking officers in Central were aware.
Tucker wasn't just a traitor to alchemy's ethics.
He was a father who betrayed his own blood.
And somehow… someone had known.Someone had acted.
Despite full-scale sweeps across the city, not a trace of Nina was found.
No footsteps. No witnesses. Not even a lock broken or a scent trail for the dogs.
It was as if she had vanished from the world entirely.
Some whispered she'd been killed.
Others—those with more faith—believed she had been saved.
But there was one constant:
Everyone agreed—whoever removed her from that house was powerful. Untraceable. Divine.
On the evening of the second day, the military released a public report.
"Shou Tucker has been declared criminally insane and stripped of all military rank and protection.His crimes against human life and natural law are confirmed through surviving documentation and physical evidence.He is no longer recognized by the State Alchemist program."
There was no mention of who delivered the justice.
But between every line was a warning.
Someone had taken a stand when the system had failed.
Far beyond the eyes of Central, in a pocket realm hidden between threads of reality, the Watcher stood alone, overlooking the rising moon from a weathered balcony.
The wind was still. The stars above unmoving.
He had watched.
He had acted.
And now—his soul needed rest.
Inside the sealed room behind him, the twisted remains of Tucker murmured unintelligible sounds, curled up on the floor where MC had left him—to be judged by the gods and his own guilt alike.
MC inhaled deeply, letting the cool air run through him.
Tomorrow, he would return.
To the villa,to the children,to the garden where peace still lived.
He whispered into the silence:
"Verdict rendered. Balance restored."
A soft blue glow began to form beneath his feet—the start of the return seal.